


Look Back

by Durinsbride



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Greek Mythology - Freeform, Misunderstandings, Orpheus and Eurydice, Romance, We All Know Bellamy is a History and Mythology Nerd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-20
Updated: 2015-02-20
Packaged: 2018-03-13 23:45:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3400631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Durinsbride/pseuds/Durinsbride
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He was looking forward, his arms at his sides, an impassive, empty cast to his eyes, his features, as if he were oblivious to his wife’s agony, or perhaps just determined to ignore it.  His eyes were directed resolutely forward, to the light and green of the meadow just beyond the mouth of the cave, as if he longed for the upper world with a love far greater than that he bore his wife.  He looked only moments away from abandoning her to the abyss forever.  As if he would let it happen, and not spare a moment for regret.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Look Back

**Author's Note:**

> Set some time after the fall of Mount Weather. Maya and the other dissenters that helped Jasper, Bellamy and the remaining 100 escape are now being held prisoner, and the Alliance is threatening to execute them. This is a one-shot. The idea came to me suddenly and I ran with it. *shrugs* This is the result.
> 
> BTW: there is a English painter named John Waterhouse, but the painting I describe in this story doesn't exist. I made it up because I couldn't find a real one that I liked enough. So I improvised from existing history/reality.

“So you’re just going to kill us all, are you?” 

 

Lexa’s step never faltered, her expression and movements serene and still, infinitely unreadable.

 

“ ** _Wait_**!”

 

He was almost screaming now, a sharp, ragged call that bore the sound of blood and bone beneath it, “you CAN’T do this!We _helped_ you— _all_ of you—and now you condemn us to die? ** _WAIT_**!”The guard closed the cell door with a loud _clang_ and stepped back, unmoved.

 

Yet Clarke felt each syllable of his desperate plea, felt his grief tear into her skin and tug her backward as surely as if his cold fingers had dug into her back, her skin, dragging her to him.Her steps faltered, and she began to turn her head over her shoulder, to look back—

 

And felt Lexa’s cool, callused fingers snag on the bottom of her chin.With a gentle press, the Commander stopped her movement and pulled her head forward.When Clarke’s gaze met her dull blue eyes, Lexa shook her head minutely.For the space of a heartbeat, Clarke held her gaze and tried to decipher what was written there, but could not.

 

 _Like the Sphinx_ , she thought, forever unreadable, her secrets buried deep in stone.“Don’t look back,” her voice the slide of sand in an ancient desert.She dropped her hand a moment later and resumed her forward tread, trusting Clarke to follow.

 

She did, and did not look back, no matter how desperately he screamed.

 

 

 

\- - - - - - - - ~~~~~~ - - - - - - - -

 

 

Later, she was wandering the corridors, barely aware of where her steps were taking her, her mind empty, terrifyingly empty; she thought of nothing at all, felt nothing at all.She was a dead stillness moving forward on legs powered by instinct alone.

 

When the light changed, going from bright to shade, and the air had shifted from warm to cool, she finally raised her head, her steps slowing as she found that she was standing at the threshold of a storage room.A _vast_ one, by the look of it, the far edge lost in a hazy, blue-black shadow.All around her, there were objects, artifacts,  sculptures and—her breath caught— _paintings_.

 

She walked toward the first that captured her eyes, hypnotized, helpless to the rush warmth and wonder that swept through her at once.It was, at last, a feeling, where there had been nothing for so long.Tears gathered at the corner of her eyes as she gazed in wonder at the cluttered room.Paintings and artwork, as far as the eye could see.Invaluable treasures, these, the only remnant of their long forgotten past.

 

A nobler… _brighter_ past.

 

She began to wander, taking it all in, but before long she found herself stopping to study the portrait of a sad, shrunken man in tattered robes, a man surrounded by heavy darkness illuminated with a single candle, grief and poverty and squalor at his feet.Her eyes were tracing the skillfully rendered lines of his battered face when she started suddenly, catching movement at the corner of her vision.

 

There was someone else here.

 

Without thought, Clarke took a step back, enfolding herself in the shadows, jealous of her unexpected sanctuary, angry at this intrusion.She did not want company, did not want to share this space, or any other, with another person.She wanted solitude.The chance to think and breathe without the presence of yet another person wanting, demanding, pleading— _screaming_ —for what they wanted, be it justice, vengeance, or mercy.

 

The figure shifted, and light fell on his wide shoulders, flashed silver in his dark, messy hair as he moved.She knew the curve of that strong back, had felt it shift under her tight hold when she’d thrown her arms around him in relief, barely able to believe that he was alive, that he was whole, that he hadn’t died in a ring of fire at her hand.

 

 _Bellamy_.

 

Her mouth opened to draw breath, to call out to him, but something stopped her, and she hesitated.They hadn’t seen or spoken to each other since the fall of the mountain, a month’s distance that felt more like a decade, and she was helpless to bridge the gap that had grown between them.They were…strangers…of a sort.

 

An emotion she couldn’t name, didn’t have the energy to process, kept her still, kept her silent, safe in the shadows as she looked at him, examined him closely.He was fast becoming yet another artifact in this room of wonders—

 

Bellamy.

 

Another beautiful, priceless work of art.

 

Another remnant of her past.

 

Now she stood in silence as she studied him with the same concentration she’d given the portrait in front of her only a moment before.She catalogued the familiar lines of his tall figure, lean and elegant, but corded with muscle, wide at the top but tapering to a sleek grace at the indent of his waist and strong legs.He possessed the same beauty as any of the marble statues that surrounded them.If he were clad in the leather armor, the braces and greaves of a Roman soldier, he would be indistinguishable from them save for the greater warmth of his honey-colored skin and black hair, more appealing by far than the silver white shine of cold, hard marble.

 

Tangible, warm, _alive_.

 

A sigh escaped her, and she was unaware that she had drifted closer to the edge of the corrugated metal shelf in front of her, her hands pressed to the cold surface, clutching at the dusty shelf with a tight grip.A terrible hollow opened in her chest, like it was collapsing in on itself.Longing swept in to fill the void, an indefinable longing for some kind of contact, connection.The longing to fill her hands with a substance that was malleable and responsive and adaptive, rather than the cold, fixed, and sharp feel of a blade, bullets, or weapons of war.

 

Like the blade he wore strapped to his thigh.

 

That thought broke her from the strange spell that had captured her the moment she set eyes on him, the space between her brows creasing as she noted the strange clothing he wore.What had happened to the clothes he’d been issued at camp?

 

The dark jacket and pants had been replaced with tight, leather breeches, a long tunic and leather arm guards.A scabbard encircled his waist, in which hung a short sword of some type, the hilt flashing dull silver under the glare of the overhead light.

 

Her frown deepened.He didn’t look like the man she knew, or had known.

 

He looked like a goddamned Grounder.

 

As if the thought had conjured her, another step sounded on the hard floor, and a girl came into view.Another of the Trigdekru.An exotic, beautiful girl with slanted eyes and a figure of a similar feline grace and build.At her entrance, Bellamy turned his eyes to her, pulling them away from the painting that he was contemplating, his lips lifting in a smile.

 

Clarke’s frown deepened, her grip on the shelf in front of her tightening.

 

“ _Heya_ _,_ ” the girl said in Trigedelang once she drew near enough to him, and her voice was as exotic as she was, deep with a slight rasp in the middle, low and pleasant and…sultry.

 

“Hi,” Bellamy returned easily, with something like appreciation in his voice, and why did it sound like there was a deep history, a shared understanding behind that single word?

 

“You are a difficult man to find, Bellamy of the Sky People…”

 

He turned fully towards her, subtly angling his body with hers, until there wasn’t too much space between them.What was going on here?

 

“Am I?”

 

When had he ever spoken like that?That wasn’t _his_ voice, his usual sound.This was deep, slow and relaxed.Like he had all the time in the world to devote to her, their conversation.These were not the tight, determined tones of man with a mission, a purpose, or a need to _do_ something.This man sounded calm, unfettered, and wholly focused on the girl before him.

 

“ _Yu ken et_,” she answered, “and I think you enjoy making others chase after you, _Skai_ _Mon_. _”_

__

 

Bellamy shifted closer to her, his head tilting sideways as his smirk deepened.“Like you are, you mean?”

 

Clarke was finding it hard to breathe.

 

The girl huffed and swung out with her right fist, punching his bicep with a sharp jab.Though it was a playful gesture, Clarke could tell there was real strength behind it.This girl was no joke; a Grounder Warrior, for sure, judging by the use of English.

 

Bellamy clutched at his upper arm and grimaced in mock pain, acting like the blow was far more terrible than it was.“You wound me, Echo…leave some for the rest of our enemies.”

 

 _Our_?

 

“I would _never_ allow that, Bellamy Blake.”The words were a solemn promise, stated as unalterable fact.And there was no mistaking the shared history of that remark.A history she wasn’t aware  of, would never be able to breech.

 

“That so?” he answered in low rasp.

 

There was a beat of silence between them as they locked eyes, seemed to be speak without words.

 

She should go.She should not be here.Her breath hitched, and a terrible pain knotted at the base of her throat.

 

She should…go.

 

After a charged moment, the girl pulled away, putting some distance between them at last.She tilted her head, and with her brusk tone and rigid stance, was suddenly all business.

 

“So, why did you come here, _Skai_ _ Mon._What is the draw of this place?”

 

Bellamy’s smirk morphed into a smile, a genuine smile that flashed white and dimpled his cheek.She’d _never_ seen him smile like that, at least, not at anything or _anyone_ but Octavia.Was he smiling at this girl?

 

She could not swallow.She was another statue among countless others.Just as immobile, just as cold.

 

“Look around,” he answered, gesturing to the dusty clutter of objects around them, “this place is full of marvels, the wonder of our past.These paintings, these artworks—they are the only surviving remnants of our past, of our brighter, perhaps _brightest_ history.Everything I used to read about, could _only_ read about, lives on in these walls.”

 

The girl…Echo, he called her, cast a skeptical glance at the objects around them, raising an eyebrow in question, clearly unimpressed by what she saw.

 

“ _This_ , you mean?These _things_ we see here, that matter no more than the ground beneath our feet?” She shook her head at him, seemed to consider his frown and answered it with her own.“These things do no _live_ at all.They are relics, and nothing more.”

 

“This place is a museum,” Bellamy countered passionately, clearly affronted by what she’d said.

 

“No,” Echo answered calmly, quickly, “it’s a _mausoleum_.Let the dead lie, _Skai_ _Mon_.”

 

Bellamy shook his head emphatically, and reaching for her, took Echo’s hand in his own, tugging her over to stand in front of the painting he’d been admiring earlier, when Clarke had been admiring him.

 

“Look at this…” he was saying.He hadn’t let go of her hand.Clarke could not move her gaze from the sight of their interlocked fingers.She kept watch, waiting for them to part, to loosen, but they did not.

 

“This painting, right here, depicts one of my favorite myths, aside from the story of Hades and Persephone, that is.”His words came quickly, hastily, and she could tell that he was very passionate about his subject.She’d never seen him so animated, so extraordinarily charming as he was now, caught in the grip of one of his fervor.She’d only ever seen him passionate about two things: protecting Octavia, and protecting their people.

 

“It’s the work of a 20th century Englishman” he continued, still holding tight to Echo’s hand, would he ever let go?“Name of John Waterhouse.This one’s dated 1903, and tells the story of Orpheus and Eurydice…”

 

Echo pulled against his grip and dug her heels in the floor; she seemed determined to resist his passion, his charm, the eager smile in his face, and the warmth of his voice.And Clarke shook her head.How could she stand calm and unmoved in the face of these things?

 

“I know nothing of these people, these things you speak of, _Skai_ _Mon_.Now let me _go_.”She grit her teeth and pulled sharply against his grip, managing enough to make him stagger in reaction to the strength behind it, but he didn’t let go.They struggled for a moment more until with a snarl, Bellamy pulled her towards him and tight against his chest, holding her close against him for a moment before turning her so that her back rested against his chest.

 

The stood locked in that posture for a long, heated moment, and Clarke could not, would _not_ look away.

 

He wrapped his arms around her and bent his head over shoulder, began to speak in hushed, reverent tones into her ear, determined to make her listen.Echo shivered, and hearing the low, gruff rumble of his voice, so did Clarke.

 

“Orpheus and Eurydice,” he repeated, “a myth, about a man that could charm all living things with his music, with his voice.He was beloved of the beautiful nymph Eurydice, but she died, and was lost to the underworld.”

 

Echo seemed caught in his words, and remained silent.Bellamy reached up and tapped her chin, tilting it up so that her eyes rested on the painting in front of them.“Look at it, “ he rasped, his arms tightening around her, “look at her face, look at his, and tell me you are not moved…”

 

Just as helpless to his suggestion, Clarke raised her eyes to the painting as well, looking at it for the first time, having failed to notice it before when she her attention had been caught by other things.Things like flirting, and solemn promises, and charming smiles.

 

And her breath caught and held when those things fell away from a moment and she looked at the painting before them.Really looked at it.

 

He was right, it _was_ beautiful.

 

A woman, a beauty with pale skin and golden hair, stood behind a tall, dark-haired man with golden skin and dark eyes.

 

She was holding him tightly, her arms wrapped around his broad shoulders, and her naked chest, her nubile breasts capped with pink nipples, was pressed to his back, her mouth open in a silent scream as an inky blackness, a swallowing abyss, tugged hard at her heels, threatening to devour her and pull her into the endless void that yawned at her feet.Tears were falling from her eyes, tracking silver and white on her smooth, unbroken skin.

 

 _He_ was looking forward, his arms at his sides, an impassive, empty cast to his eyes, his features, as if he were oblivious to his wife’s agony, or perhaps just determined to ignore it.His eyes were directed resolutely forward, to the light and green of the meadow just beyond the mouth of the cave, as if he longed for the upper world with a love far greater than that he bore his wife.He looked only moments away from abandoning her to the abyss forever.As if he would _let_ it happen, and not spare a moment for regret.

 

“He’s abandoning her,” Echo said, seeming to track Clarke’s thoughts with an eerie synchronicity, “she’s dying…something is pulling at her, pulling her away.And he’s _letting_ it.”Her voice was broken with emotion at last, seemed to threaten tears, and Clarke felt very much the same.

 

“No, he’s _not,_ ” Bellamy answered, his tone determined and adamant, and he squeezed the girl in front of him in emphasis.“You have to understand.He was told, _warned_ , really, by Hades—the God of the Dead, of the Underworld, that she would not be allowed to return to the land of the living if he so much as glanced back to see if she were following.Hades told him to leave his realm with Eurydice at his heels but _never_ to look back.It was the only way to save her.”

 

Echo shook her head.“But he’s not saving her!”And now it did sound like she was actually crying.“She’s caught in the darkness and it’s eating her alive, and he’s _looking the other way_.”

 

“But maybe he isn’t.He’s just distracted by the future, perhaps, the future of their lives _together_.He wants that more than anything, but he doesn’t know how to go about it.He just wants her to return to the living world and _remain_ with him, to stay by his side and love him as she always did, as he loved her.As they did in the beginning…”

 

Bellamy paused; there was such sadness in his words, such an aching loneliness that it was almost tangible in the air between them.Even Clarke could taste it were she stood on shaking legs.Perhaps she imagined, caught in the story as she was, that the floor beneath her feet was fast becoming a morass, shifting and sinking beneath her and threatening to pull her under.Ready to devour her while he was turned away, ignorant of her terrible, desperate agony.

 

“Then he _is_ saving her?”

 

Bellamy nodded, his embrace tightening, and with a terrible feeling of falling into the deep, she suddenly understood his argument.He _was_ saving her, the girl in his arms—or had saved her—at some point.She could feel it somehow, the lingering threat of death that had once stood between them, and that he had fought for her, fought to save her.

 

“You see, in the original myth, Orpheus _failed_ her: he didn’t listen to the warning and he looked back at her just before they cleared the mouth of the Underworld, and it was all he could do to watch, helpless, as she was taken away from him, swallowed up in the darkness and despair of the land of the dead, her home forever more…”

 

Echo turned slightly in his embrace, looking into his eyes, seeking for something there, and frowning when she seemed to find it.

 

“He made a promise to her, just like you made a promise to me.”

 

Bellamy nodded.“I said I would come back for you, and I did.You saved my life, and I saved yours.”

 

The abyss, Clarke realized, beckoned, and she now found that she was eager, ready to let it take her.She had nothing here to claim, nothing that waited for her in the circle of light just beyond.He was turned away, and she was lost.

 

The girl reached up and cupped his jaw, cradled the side of his face in her hand, looking at him with a softened, affectionate gaze.He looked back with the same.

 

Clarke was lost.He was looking away.

 

“You made a promise, didn’t you?” Echo was asking.

 

Bellamy shook his head, confused, “I don’t know what you mea—”

 

“To _her_ , your Eurydice.Right?”

 

Bellamy dropped his eyes, his hands folding over Echo’s waist, and he shook his head once more.“It’s just a story.”

 

Echo pulled back.Her caress stilled against his jaw, and she smiled sadly.“And that is why _you_ are turned away, when _I_ have been looking back to you.”

 

Bellamy raised his head, frowning.

 

“What?”

Echo bent forward, her mouth meeting his in a gentle kiss.Bellamy hesitated, but a moment later her breathed out a sigh, tilting his head and slanting his mouth over hers, kissing her properly.

 

She should not be here.Was never meant to be here.But she could not move.The abyss was pulling her under.

 

Echo drew back from him, his embrace, his kiss, and took a step back from him.

 

“You are a man that honors his promises, Bellamy Blake.Just as I honor mine.”She caressed his cheek once more, her thumb sweeping over his mouth before she stepped away, regret shading her eyes.

 

“We are _Bludkin_ ,” she announced, gesturing between them, “and nothing will change that.”She turned away, started walking towards the exit, and her parting words, when they came, were delivered over her shoulder.“Now it is my turn to walk away and look forward.Toward the future.”

 

Bellamy stood rooted to the spot for a moment, and he appeared confused, but a moment later, watching her retreating form, he seemed to come to his senses, break from his fog.

 

“Echo!Echo wait!”He even reached for her.

 

The girl did not turn back, and vanished beyond the threshold.

 

Bellamy watched the doorway for a long time after her departure.

 

 

 

\- - - - - - - - ~~~~~~ - - - - - - - -

 

 

 

“You are _not_ going to kill these people.I don’t care what argument you make, what claim you think you have on their lives, _I_ won’t allow it.”Bellamy stood resolute before the council, the alliance—before the world—his dark eyes heated with anger and determination.He looked to each person in turn, his eyes sweeping over Clarke with nothing more than the barest remnant of any connection between them, a shared past.He seemed to look at her as if she were one of _them_ now, the People of the Ark, formerly of the Sky, now the People of Earth.

 

“They helped to save the lives of _my_ people, and I won’t have them killed for it.”

 

Lexa was unmoved, as always.

 

“They and their people have slaughtered mine for generations.The blood of my kin in on _their_ hands as well; they did nothing to stop the murder of my people for  their blood, and that argues for their guilt beyond anything you can say.You owe your obedience to _your_ people now.”

 

Bellamy shook his head.He gestured to the council, the alliance, to her, perhaps, and Clarke knew there was no looking back now.

 

“These are _not_ my people.Those that _I_ saved, that I brought out of the mountain. _Those_ are my people.Those that helped me and my friends when we would have been slaughtered by Cage and his cohorts, _those are my people_.”He gestured to Maya and Maya’s father, where they stood in shackles at the edge of the meeting room, watching the proceedings with dulled eyes.

 

Jasper rose from his seat and came forward, clapping his hand on Bellamy’s shoulder.“We ask that you release the prisoners, and return our people to us.We will leave this territory, and take them with us,” Jasper’s dark eyes met Maya’s hopeful ones.“We are no longer yours to command.”

 

A murmur from the crowd, several disturbances broke out among them.Lexa scanned the crowd, capturing each dissenting face in turn.

 

“And this is your wish, Bellamy Blake.To break your allegiance with us?”

 

Bellamy nodded.He did not look at Clarke, standing by Lexa’s side.

 

“Yes.That is our wish.”

 

Lexa nodded, calling for silence as her people, the Woods Clan and the River Clan began to mutter anew, clearly angry about this development.

 

“Silence.We will take this matter into consideration, and consider sparing the lives of our prisoners.”She gestured at Maya and the other former residents of Mount Weather, those people that had helped Bellamy and the rest of their former camp escape from Cage in the final confrontation.

 

‘That is all.”Her tone was one of dismissal.The meeting, for now, was adjourned.

 

 

 

\- - - - - - - - ~~~~~~ - - - - - - - -

 

 

 

When Clarke turned a corner, she nearly ran into his back.She stepped back to regain her balance, and pulled her hands away from where they’d landed and touched for one moment, the wide span of his shoulders.

 

“Bellamy!”

 

She hadn’t been this close to him on months, and she frowned at the flow of warmth in her hands that lingered from where they’d touched him.She could still feel his solid flesh under her fingers.

 

He didn’t turn to look at her.He never looked at her anymore.

 

“Clarke.”He acknowledged, and at the sound of his voice, something broke inside her.

 

“So…you’re really going to leave?”

He nodded.Why wouldn’t he _look_ at her?

 

“I am.All of us. Jasper, Maya, Miller.Our peop—I mean, _my_ people.”

 

Clarke fought to keep the emotion out of her voice.“They're my people, too, Bellamy."

 

He almost turned his head, but at the last moment, he pulled it back, eyes resolutely forward.

 

“Are they?You're the leader of the People of the Ark. At least, that’s the choice you’ve made, isn’t it?”

 

Clarke didn’t know anymore.She thought she had made her choice, but now she wasn’t so sure.

 

“I don’t know where I belong, or who I lead.”

 

Bellamy’s back stiffened.

 

“Well, then you better make up your mind.Let me know when you do,” and he started to walk away.Away from her, staring directly ahead.That Grounder girl, Echo, was waiting at the gates of the camp, waiting for him, it seemed, and Clarke thought that perhaps he was looking at his future.

 

Still.

 

“Bellamy!”

 

Her voice broke on his name.He was leaving her behind, he was _leaving_ , and he would go on to the sunlit world without her.

 

He stopped, but he did not turn his head.He waited for a moment, and then he spoke:

 

“You will follow, or you wont.I can’t look back.”

 

Clarke watched him go.Watched until he was at the gate, eyes locked on the path before him.

 

Clarke took a step.Then another.

 

The abyss pulled at her heels, but she stepped forward anyway.

Then kept walking. 

One step after another.

**Author's Note:**

> I used some actual Trigedeslang in this story, and made up some of my own. Here are the translations:
> 
>  _Heya_ : Hello
> 
>  _Yu ken et_ : You Know it
> 
>  _Skai Mon_ : Sky Man
> 
>  _Bludkin_ : Blood Kin ( I made up the idea that once you save someone's life, according to Grounder custom, you are bound forever after as if by blood. Sort of like family, or even husband and wife, forever more.
> 
> And let me reiterate:
> 
> There isn't a painting by John Waterhouse of Orpheus and Eurydice. He was a painter of classical subjects and mythology, but he did not paint anything for this myth. I made it up because I couldn't find one I liked by any painter. I'm sorry for any confusion or disappointment this may cause, and please forgive the liberties I have taken--I just couldn't find anything I liked well enough to use for the story. I just liked the myth so much, and I needed something that would work with this, so that was the result.


End file.
